Part 5 -- Discipleship Arm Dance: He Went Into the Wilderness, He Defeated the Devil, He Came Out of the Wilderness

  9 Pentecost 2013

Father Adam Trambley

July 21, 2013, St. John’s Sharon

The Discipleship Arm Dance – Part 5

He went into the wilderness; He defeated the devil; He came out of the wilderness

(Part 1 Here, Part 2 Here, Part 3 Here, Part 4 Here)

This week we are going to continue working through the Discipleship Arm Dance.   

 Jesus was baptized by John.

He came up out of the water.

He received the Holy Spirit.

He heard the voice of God, “You are my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

He went into the wilderness.

He defeated the devil.

He came out of the wilderness.

He announced his purpose.

He chose four others.

He taught them everything they needed to know.

He sent them out.

We’ve looked at the first four steps so far.  We’ve talked about the surrender to God in the context of a local church, and the need to step out into the life God has in store with the support of the local church.  We’ve talked about the Holy Spirit coming down and filling us, and how we can hear the voice of God tell us we are his beloved when we allow God to come into our entire lives.  This week we are going to focus on three lines: “He went into the wilderness.  He defeated the devil.  He came out of the wilderness.” 

As soon as Jesus heard God assuring him that he was his beloved Son, the Spirit drove Jesus out into the wilderness.  Two weeks ago we talked about how the Holy Spirit lets us feel God’s love throughout our being, and then starts burning away all the parts of our life that aren’t fully compatible with God’s plan and purposes for our lives.  The Spirit blowing throughout our lives takes us into the desert, shows us the devil we need to defeat in our lives, and provides what we need to do so.

For Jesus, he was driven by the Spirit into the wilderness.  He did not necessarily expect to go.  But he chose to surrender to God and the wilderness was stop numero uno on the divine road trip.  If Jesus had stayed at home, the opportunities to figure out what he needed to deal with would not have come.  Imagine being the only Son of a perfect Jewish mother.  Maybe God knew that a little separation was needed before anything else could happen.

Then, once Jesus was in the wilderness, he defeated the devil.  Now we wouldn’t necessarily expect Jesus to

need to defeat the devil in his own life.  He hadn’t sinned and didn’t have any addictions.  He hadn’t ever seen a raunchy R-rated movie or played Texas hold-um with the rent money.  But even Jesus had pieces of his life that needed to be solidified before he could hope to live into his purpose.  While Jesus’ temptations are paradigms for all temptations, they also are very specific to Jesus.  Turn stones into bread.  Guess what, Jesus had to decide that the powerful love and provision of God that he knew and could bring about was not just for his own comfort and the comfort of those around him, but had to serve a higher purpose.  Otherwise he spends his life and God’s gift as just a local bread distributer.  A noble calling, but not Jesus’ calling.  Throw yourself off the temple and order angels to save you.  Jesus had to decide that having angels at his beck and call was not to glorify himself through reckless stunts but to allow him to achieve God’s purpose and glorify God, even if the stunts would have made great television.  Finally, gain all the kingdoms of the world if only bow down and worship the devil.  Jesus had to think about just how much better everyone would be if he made the compromise that gave him all worldly power instead of leaving it with all the current kings and governors, and then he decided to forego that path and follow his Father’s way of self-giving love.  Jesus couldn’t have been ready to feed and heal people, to cast out demons, and to rely on angelic support in difficult times unless he had stared down all the temptations he would later face and knew exactly what he needed to do.  He defeated the devil and began his ministry with eyes open.

Then he came out of the wilderness.   Coming out of the wilderness is hard.  Jesus had just spent forty days overcoming everything difficult, and now angels were finally waiting on him.  The wilderness was now a comfortable place, and instead of enjoying it, Jesus has to come out and begin his ministry.

You and I have our wilderness experiences, too, and usually we are driven into them.  They are usually those times when our regular routines of life get totally changed around and we have to face trying circumstances.  If we have given ourselves over to God, then the Holy Spirit is going to work with those trying circumstances to show us the places where we have to defeat the devil in our own lives.  The circumstances themselves are generally not what we need to overcome, but our difficulties make us face the pieces of ourselves that we need to change if we are going to live out God’s purpose.  Now I’m not saying that when life is difficult the Holy Spirit is at fault.  I’m just saying that when life is difficult, the Holy Spirit is going to drive us into looking at the devils in our life to defeat.

Now these wilderness places we are driven into probably aren’t going off to a cabin for a retreat.  Retreats are important for many reasons, and when we take times away from our life and give them to God he uses it.  But, for example, I spent eight days in January on a silent retreat.  I needed to do it for a number of reasons, and spending that time in prayer was huge.  But that retreat wasn’t the same kind of wilderness that I’ve faced for the past two weeks since I tweaked my back and have had to tell some folks I couldn’t do things I had planned to do.  For me, being quiet isn’t that hard, but feeling like I am letting people down or am unable to keep a commitment because I’m not up to it really ties me up in knots inside.  Yet I know that if I care too much about disappointing people or trying to keep their opinion about me at a certain level, then I’m in danger of caring more about what people think than about what God wants me to do.  So my challenge in this minor wilderness is to defeat that devil of caring too much about other people’s opinions so that I can care more about God’s opinion, since the two somehow don’t always coincide.     

But that is just one example of the kind of wilderness we face.  Sometimes we face financial crises, either of our own over-spending or a job loss or health crisis or significant personal problems or other difficulty.  If we are paying attention, the Holy Spirit will show us what we need to defeat in that wilderness.  Maybe we find ourselves angry and lashing out at those we are supposed to love and support.  Maybe we find ourselves increasing our alcohol consumption.  Maybe we sink into depression and despair.  Maybe we realize we haven’t had an honest conversation with our spouse about how to set priorities and make financial decisions.  Maybe we beat up little kids on their way to school and steal their lunch money.  Whatever our own weakness and temptations are, we clearly face them in the wildernesses of our lives when things get difficult.  Then when we starkly see our choices, if we defeat the devil, we shouldn’t have any trouble when our normal rhythms of life are re-established.

So just how do we defeat the devil in the wilderness?  Doing what we know we are supposed to do – prayer, worship, scripture, confession, seeking support and council from godly men and woman who can help us.  Opening up to someone else, especially someone who has faced and overcome similar struggles, can be exceptionally helpful.  Being honest with someone and getting support and sometimes good advice can be essential. 

I also want to talk about one specific tool today for the kind of accountability that helps us defeat the devils in our lives.  In your bulletins you’ll find a blue sheet describing LifeTransformation Groups.  Now Life Transformation Groups aren’t the only way overcoming our temptations in the wilderness or of being accountable to others, but they are a simple and powerful way of doing so.  In fact, beginning to work in a Life Transformation Group actually helps take us into the wilderness to do what we need to do there, and some people have found Life Transformation Groups to be the natural next step after we have turned over of life to God.  

A Life Transformation Group is designed for two or three people and has three components.  The first is accountability in living a Christian life.  You can see the questions on the page are pretty exhaustive and cove a whole lot of ground.  They give an opportunity for us to work with other Christians to discover and defeat whatever devils are lurking in dark corners of our lives.  The second component is scripture reading.  We read about 25-30 chapters of scripture a week, which means that as we are emptying ourselves of our sinfulness, we are filling ourselves up with God’s revelation.  Then we pray for those we know who need to have their life transformed and invite people to join us.  As the group grows to four and beyond, it multiplies into two groups and keeps going.  Between now and September a number of people connected with the parish are planning to begin Life Transformation Groups.  If you have questions, or are interested, let me or Deacon Randy know. (Or go on-line to CMA Resource's website at http://cmaresources.org/article/ltg where you can get more information and order your own materials.)

Of course, after we’ve defeated the devil in our lives, we, too, need to come out of the wilderness.  We need to incorporate the gains we’ve achieved in the wilderness into our everyday lives.  Sometimes that work is difficult, but our work in the desert is intended to change our lives when we come out.

Now when we think about unchurched people we want to share the good news with and disciple, our perspective has to shift.  Mainly, we have to recognize that for people who haven’t been in a church all their lives, coming to St. John’s may very well be their wilderness.  They could be in an uncomfortable place with new people where they are opening themselves up to a new way of life.  Our job is to help them defeat whatever devils they face when they are here.  But that work is not necessarily the same work we generally think about when we think of church work.

Jesus was in the wilderness for forty days, and that time period is about what it takes to support someone in defeating a devil in their life.  To help someone may take a variety of forms.  They may need someone to call daily to see how things are going and get the support and encouragement they need.  They may need someone to call, a lot at first, to say, I’m really mad right now and want to hit somebody, so help talk me down and say a prayer with me.  They may need someone to give them rides to twelve-step meetings every day for a month.  They may need someone to be in a Life Transformation Group with, or to pray with on a regular basis.  They may need someone to share a meal with regularly if they have recently been widowed.  They may need good people that they and their family can be friends with, especially if they are isolated from their own extended family.  Whatever they need, we will probably be required not just to be at church with people, but to share part of our lives with people.   St. John’s knows how to be more than a Sunday morning community, because many of you have been getting together with people from church more often than Sunday morning for years.   Helping others defeat the devil may mean having the relationships we are accustomed to having in a way that is intentionally open to new Christians.  Then, those new folks we are discipling can come out of the wilderness and restart the rhythms of their day-to-day life in ways that incorporate a church family.

Jesus was baptized by John.

He came up out of the water.

He received the Holy Spirit.

He heard the voice of God, “You are my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

He went into the wilderness.

He defeated the devil.

He came out of the wilderness.

He announced his purpose.

He chose four others.

He taught them everything they needed to know.

He sent them out.